


wonderfully made

by fav_littleleaf



Series: Sixth Form AU [1]
Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Emotional Manipulation, Gaslighting, Grooming, M/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Teacher-Student Relationship, Trans Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist, also probably autistic/ADHD, bullying in later chapters
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-05
Updated: 2021-01-05
Packaged: 2021-03-15 08:07:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,379
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28560291
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fav_littleleaf/pseuds/fav_littleleaf
Summary: In search of future avatars of the Eye, Elias Bouchard makes it his business to groom young students. He may also have a personal motive or two.Jonathan Sims is not his first victim, but he may very well be the last.
Relationships: Elias Bouchard | Jonah Magnus/Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist, Other Relationship Tags to Be Added
Series: Sixth Form AU [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2092527
Comments: 9
Kudos: 24





	wonderfully made

**Author's Note:**

> two days before Christmas, I called my best friend at midnight and said “tell me all about the Regency era” and one and a half hours later, this chapter sprouted! most special thanks are due to him, esp for Britpicking despite being deeply offended by Elias’s general existence <3

The first day of Year 12 is on a Tuesday, which totally doesn’t bother Jon at all.

On the list of other things that don’t bother Jon: his hair is a mess, he had a nightmare about tarantulas, _again,_ and last night he was so busy re-reading the chapter for History that he forgot to ask Georgie if she could give him a ride today. The sketchy bus through Clapham, then. Lovely.

Jon bustles through the kitchen, shrugging on his blazer as he makes a beeline for his rucksack. He had lovingly prepared it the night before, with not only his course textbooks, but a number of his favourite novels. Just in case of a particularly bad teacher. If he’s not getting anything out of it, why listen? It’s efficiency, that’s all.

He stops dead in his tracks when he sees the Superman lunch box sitting on the counter. _That’s_ not going to be good for anyone. He pries it open and dumps the contents — a chicken salad sandwich, some sliced apples — into a brown bag instead. When he’s satisfied with his newfound potential to be a normal teenager, he notices a scrap of paper flutter to the ground. 

_Make some friends today, Jon.  
_ _xx, Gran_

Jon rolls his eyes. Not with Superman, he won’t.

There’s another surprise waiting for him when he lifts his rucksack to deposit his lunch. It’s _far_ too light. Had he dreamed packing the extra books, too? With trembling fingers, he investigates inside and finds that there are no books at all — just a spiral-bound one for notes, and a pack of chewing gum from four months ago at best. 

Confusion washes over him. He’s sure he did this last night. 

He squints into the depths of his bag as if it holds answers, but then it hits him: it’s not his fault this time.

Jon grabs the note from the counter and swipes his thumb over the closing: _“xx, Gran.”_ She normally only leaves one kiss. Was that supposed to be some sort of _penance_ for taking all his books? 

_“He’s always reading another book on top of his course one. Thinks he’s being clever, I guess. But he really needs to pay attention, Mrs. Sims.”_

The memory floats through his mind without remorse. Did it matter that he got all 8s and 9s on his GCSEs (except the 7 in Music, but that was not relevant)? No, of course not. 

_“I’m just concerned about his social capabilities,”_ his teacher had said, as if he wasn’t there, as if making something of himself was secondary to having raucous orgies in some kid’s basement.

He doesn’t bother shouting out for her; she’s gone. Instead, he searches her room for any sign of them — even just the textbooks — but then his alarm starts buzzing and he has to catch the bus, clutching his bag to his arms as if that could sew together the aching chasm in his chest.

He wishes all he cared about was that it’s Tuesday.   
  


* * *

  
The lack of books manifests itself in odd ways over the course of the morning. His new uniform itches unbearably at the collar, even though he’d washed it no less than three times to avoid exactly this. His right leg won’t stop bouncing, despite rational input, until they’re in History waiting for their teacher to show up. Apparently Martin tires of it.

He puts a hand on Jon’s shoulder. “Are you okay?”

Jon stiffens by instinct, and Martin withdraws his hand like he’s been burned. “’m fine,” he mutters over Martin’s apologies.

He knows it’s irrational; being unprepared on the first day is hardly the end of the world. But there’s something about books that grounds him — the weight of them in his arms, the woodsy smell that invites him into another world, better and more beautiful than his own. The way they soothe the rough edges of reality into something a little softer, whispering secrets made of lullabies and kerosene lamps in the moonlight. 

“Yes, I’m really fine,” Jon says when Martin doesn’t leave him alone. His leg has stopped shaking, at least. 

Some of the chatter around the room filters into his consciousness. Two rows in front of him, a few students he knows from GCSE whisper in each others’ ears and throw furtive glances behind them. He can’t tell if they’re looking at him, but his skin prickles anyway; he draws his blazer closer in on himself and tries not to think about it. He _really_ doesn’t want to think about it. Self-righteous teachers are one thing, but a group of fifteen year-olds with an agenda is quite another.

He’s spared the difficulty of avoiding that rabbit hole when the classroom door opens. 

The man that enters the room strides in like he owns it, unapologetic that it is eleven minutes past the hour. He drops a briefcase over the chair at the front of the room, the sleeves of his dark grey three-piece suit rustling as he bends. His aura seems to repel wrinkles.

“Good day, students,” he says, his voice quieter and more mild than Jon has expected. “My name is Mr. Bouchard. You’ve apparently had the great misfortune of signing up for a course on Georgian-era England with me.” 

There’s a general murmur of amusement through the room. Mr. Bouchard shrugs off his suit jacket and turns to place it over the chair as well. “Now is your chance to back out,” he says pleasantly, turning back to look at them. His gaze sweeps the entire room as he unbuttons his left sleeve, rolling it slowly up to the elbow. “No one? Suit yourselves, then.”

Mr. Bouchard smiles as he rolls up his other sleeve. It’s warm, personal in a way Jon isn’t used to, and he relaxes a little, despite himself.

“Because this is your first year as A-level students, we will spend the first part of class reviewing structure and expectations. I know it’s dreadfully boring, but I will suggest, for your own sake, that you pay close attention.”

Jon is sympathetic to paying attention, and often wants to plunk people over the head for not doing so, but his mind wanders ruthlessly. Even as Mr. Bouchard begins his proper lecture on rationalism and the reaction against it heading into the Victorian era, his brain feels like a sieve. 

His shirt still itches uncomfortably, and he pulls at it, barely noticing when his leg starts to shake again. Thankfully, the material is familiar from the reading he had done last night, and he can manage to fill in the gaps.

_Rationalism posits that reason is the chief source of knowledge and improvement. The doctrine of sensibility was the reaction: humans don’t need improvement. They are already good, by nature._

It doesn’t matter about the textbook — it’s already in his head.

Martin elbows him this time. “Seriously, what’s wrong?”

_It doesn’t matter about the textbook._

“Books,” he whispers, unhelpfully.

“What?” Martin says. He looks Jon slowly up and down, and then realization dawns on his face. He shoves his own book towards Jon with an elbow. Then ignores Jon’s muted protests and attempts to shove it back.

Mr. Bouchard’s voice draws them both out of their scuffle. “All right. Does everyone feel they have a basic grasp of the material thus far?”

Unenthusiastic nods pepper the room. Jon would normally be the one to answer verbally, but his throat feels like sandpaper, and he feels guilty for already missing so much. It can’t have been longer than twenty or twenty-five minutes. How does the first day always feel so _long?_

“Lovely,” Mr. Bouchard says, apparently choosing to ignore their lack of enthusiasm. “Then I would like you all to rise from your seats.”

Jon and Martin glance at each other in confusion. They aren’t the only ones who do so.

Mr. Bouchard doesn’t seem bothered that they don’t immediately follow. He continues: “Those who feel more sympathy with the aims of ‘sense’ and rationalism, I want you on the left side of the classroom. With ‘sensibility’ and romanticism, on the right side. During my lifetime, please.”

Jon obeys, but his mind whirrs with twin instincts of curiosity and disdain. Did he think they were still in primary school? What a sodding mess. He looks over at Martin, hoping for a sympathetic reaction, but he’s grinning, and gets up properly before Jon does.

Mr. Bouchard tuts at the people who linger near their seats, giving them disapproving looks that serve as insistently as any physical touch would. As Jon passes them, he hears one mumble to another, “why do we have to _choose,”_ and Jon privately scoffs. Clearly sentimentality is codswallop. People who just _give in_ to feelings — they’re weak, the lot of them.

He finds, unpleasantly, that he is in the minority. It’s a large minority, but still. Perhaps worse, he realizes Martin hasn’t followed him. Martin glances at him from across the room, with a soft look that he doesn’t know how to interpret.

Once they’re all settled, Mr. Bouchard makes his way to Jon’s side of the room. He asks for a volunteer, and the only problem with being the official class nerd is thus: _they all look at Jon._

Gingerly, Jon raises his hand.

Mr. Bouchard nods towards him. “Name?” 

“Jonathan Sims, sir.”

“Jonathan,” he repeats, his lips forming a mild smile around the name. “Defend your position, if you would.” 

Jon responds instantly. “It’s pretty clear-cut if you ask me. How can you learn anything if you’re distracted by _emotions?”_

A few of the boys who had been eyeing him earlier elbow each other, doing a poor job of concealing sniggers. Mr. Bouchard snaps his head towards them. “Boys,” he warns. They straighten up without protest.

“In what circumstances do you imagine it might have been useful to be a man of sensibility? Of emotions, as you say? Surely,” Mr. Bouchard says in a softer tone, stepping a little closer to Jon, “if it were as useless as you claim, an entire movement would not have arisen in the mid-century?”

Jon resists a cough. “I, erm, I suppose, well.” He pulls at his collar, but it doesn’t release the itching at his throat. “It’s political, isn’t it?”

“Go on.”

“Sensibility would have been tactical for people who didn’t want social or educational reform. Landed gentry, maybe, who already had what they wanted. Land, servants. They would have seen what happened during the revolution in France and wanted England to stay far away from that.”

“Yes, very good.” 

Jon preens, by instinct, and with some amount of shame. Mr. Bouchard presses him further, but he starts to feel more comfortable at least. He knows the answers to these questions. They have solid, reliable traces in historical fact. This — _this_ is comfortable and good.

“But, I wonder — what about the non-political side?” 

The way his voice goes quiet makes Jon’s stomach twist. He shifts a little on his feet. “Sorry?” 

Someone else near him puts their hand up. Apparently they had been doing so for a while, because they’re inching up eagerly on their toes. Mr. Bouchard raises a hand towards them in conciliation, his eyes never leaving Jon’s.

“Do you reject the innate benevolence of man, Jonathan?”

The question feels _personal,_ in a way that skewers him. He feels the stares of his classmates burning into him, or maybe that’s just the way Mr. Bouchard looks at him, spilling into the consciousness of everyone around him. Ridiculously, he thinks of the sandwich he’d put in his bag that morning; he’d forgotten to put in ice, so it will probably spoil by lunchtime. His stomach twists again.

“I — no. I think we can improve ourselves, through reason. But that doesn’t mean that human nature isn’t intrinsically good, or that…” He shifts on his feet again, trying to ease the tremble settling over him. “Or that… _feelings_ , aren’t useful. I guess.”

Mr. Bouchard nods, looking pleased. But he needles Jon further, and he feels like he gives less and less satisfactory answers.

Finally, after what feels like forever, Mr. Bouchard nods at him with a finality that instantly undoes the knots in his lungs and throat. He gestures for Jon to sit, and then moves on to the others, treating them each with the same quiet gravitas. Jon holds Martin’s textbook close to his chest as he watches the others, wishing he didn’t feel for each of them.

When they’ve all returned to their seats, there are only two minutes left in the class period. 

Mr. Bouchard smiles at them; it’s bright, stunning, and chilling all at once. “My goal for this class is to make you uncomfortable. History is never silent or neat, and we cannot allow ourselves to be complacent.” He walks up to the front row of desks, and his eyes land on Jon’s — just for an instant.

“There will be no secrets here,” he says, and then pitches his voice low. “Is that understood?”

Mr. Bouchard does not need to coax them into answering; nor does Jon speak for them. They reply _“yes, sir”_ as one.

It only occurs to Jon much later that they had been warned, well in advance, to pay attention, and also given the opportunity to back out. 

Well. He’d never been one to back down from a challenge.

* * *

Jonah Magnus considers his options.

The normally bustling hallways of the Institute have surrendered to silence, and the night is deep. Outside of here, Jonah lets his mind wander over eyes fluttered closed and bodies pliant under moon-slivered sheets. Only he watches. Just the way it’s meant to be. And now he can begin.

He taps a fountain pen over the textured wood of his desk, scanning idly over a list of names. It has been a successful day, all told. If for no other reason than to bask in the cascade of fear and anxiety inherent to youths flirting with the precipice of adulthood. 

A little nudge in the right direction never hurt, either.

There had been such a quantity, for each class, that he didn’t need to sink into their minds to appreciate its surfeit. In fact, he’d found it rather more satisfying to drink all of it in as an outsider: the furrow of the brow, the minute beads of sweat dripping down the temple, flayed open and christened, one by one. Each of those who listened, undoubtedly worrying if their turn might go as poorly or worse. And most of all, the person who knew they were next in line: the thrumming of their pulse all but visible under their skin, the tremor of their hands as they accepted their fate.

It’s a shame that he can only _really_ experience one of them at a time. But then he would not want to open all of the Eye’s gifts at once, anyway.

Jonah sighs. He’s becoming distracted. The current feast is not the point of this exercise.

He turns his attention back to the roster, beginning at the bottom of the alphabet and working his way up. He writes down flashes of impressions, skimming over the surface as a first pass. Most of them are unremarkable: hapless creatures with all the bravado of youth but none of the wiles of age. To Jonah, who needs both, this is a frustrating endeavor. Especially given that their minds are so full of chaotic energy that to step into them seeking insight is tantamount to crawling through a minefield. And yet, choosing to refrain is a fruitful way to remind himself of the virtues of patience. This will be a _years-long_ partnership at best, this journey that is being made for them. It will not serve to hurry.

As he makes his way up the list, he marks the names of three orphans: Greg Montgomery, Jonathan Sims, and Doris Hardy. These tended to be a good start — except for what happened last year, but it’s not like that had been Jonah’s error — so he needed to be wary, but the potential was at least worth marking. They were so desperate to learn and please, so full of deference, not to mention delightfully touched by the Lonely. It was attractive in its own right, yes, but that often meant their true place was bent over his desk, not seated at his right side for eternity. Pity that such indulgences would be frowned upon by the school.

No, he needed someone with a will clad in bronze: one that would bend, but not break.

Second pass over. The child’s propensity to break may be difficult to determine from a single brushstroke, and broad demographics makes narrowing down a large list a difficult task. But what he _could_ determine was another essential quality for his Archivist: the relentless pursuit of knowledge, unabated by inklings of the supernatural or strange. Boundless curiosity.

This pass draws off more names; ones who had responded too strongly on either side of the unanswerable debate he’d set them with during class. Reason, passion — both were necessary, at all times. Of course, sixteen year-olds were not likely to entertain mature perspectives on this matter, but why waste time on those when others were already there? He is also careful not to cross off those who had merely been unprepared to discuss historical trends after a single day, regardless of their thoughts on the philosophy itself. That had been Jonah’s weakness, not theirs.

There was one who had responded most curiously to the philosophy, at least. His pen finds the name and marks it a second time: _Jonathan Sims._

Jonathan’s grasp on the material was impressive for being the first day, corroborated by the others’ general response to him as something of the class nerd. Fine — there were always a handful of those. It was his unbudging resistance to all notion that sentimentality may be important, hiding an anxiety that seemed to shine particularly bright. 

This, _by itself_ , was not interesting. It might even be expected for a boy of his age, especially one whose gender clearly did not match the expectations society had set for him. Jonah had struggled with this, himself, in a world and time far removed from this one. 

Yes, sensitivities towards both reason and passion ran through him like electric currents, intense in almost equal measure. But the success with which he shoved his feelings down, despite the brightness of each of them in his blood — _that_ is what was so fascinating. And yet Jonathan remained so pliant, admitting himself to Jonah after only a few minutes of gentle questioning. Jonah could barely imagine the unfettered joy of cutting that part of him open until Jonathan acknowledged his true nature: made not of benevolence, but fear. Of blood, of flesh, the carnal passion of being known, sense and sensibility twined together like ribbons in an unequivocal whole.

Jonah permits himself a wander through the possibilities. Was there darkness there, hidden under where Jonathan kept his heart under lock and key? Something that he might be able to coax into peeking out, if he were gentle enough with Jonathan? He doesn’t need his Archivist to have said darkness — they could just as well carry out his plan without conscious knowledge of it — but if it were possible, in the end, he’d prefer a willing servant. Something to spin out of clay, to make perfect, and perhaps one day, even something to cherish.

 _That_ is something he’ll have to think about later, in the privacy of his home.

Jonah takes a deep, shuddering breath. He must remain wary. Nothing good comes from becoming too excited too soon. 

He works his way up the list further, marking several names in the same manner as Jonathan’s. Feeling generous, he even highlights a few in green for Peter. Greg and Doris might be good for him, and a boy named Martin Blackwood.

He sits back against the padded cushion of his chair and picks up the list to admire his handiwork. About a quarter have been crossed off; maybe a third marked to pay more careful attention to over the course of the year. There’s hope yet for this little project.

It’s not a bad day’s work, for a Tuesday.


End file.
